045

3.1.1.
After Herod’s death in 4 BC, the Emperor Augustus divided the kingdom among Herod’s sons. Antipas was allocated

Mosul, Jonas mosque

Galilee and Peraea, an area with a large Jewish population. However, the Yahweh temple in Jerusalem, the centre of Jewish religious practice, was outside his princedom.

3.1.2.
To weld his princedom together, Antipas required an ideology, either a religion or a cultural idea to legitimise his claim to rule and to give a sense of community to the mainly Jewish population.